By Dustin Cabeal

After a steady flow of reviews for this series, I needed a break. Something about this fourth episode just killed any and all motivation I had going. Possibly because the series continues to have zero logic. I don’t mean real world logic either. That doesn’t need to exist in fantasy-based stories, but the world presented should have a logic to it. Rules if you will, but this show barely establishes the normal before shitting all over it. Each episode seems to follow the same rhythm in which the norm of this underground world is established and then Rattle gets to break all the rules in some attempt to show how different and special she is in this world.

The problem with that is that her rule-breaking is our norm because we never experience anything else. All the talking and time-wasting ends up being pointless exposition. Frankly, I don’t find the world that Rattle is flipping on its head all that amazing, to begin with. Rich people betting with people’s lives can work and be interesting, but not when the people fighting think they’re doing something noble and accomplishing a goal. No, you’re not, you’re a betting tool.

This episode, everyone is transported to a giant fucking cruise ship. They make it a point of saying how goddamn big this thing is like a small country could live aboard. All the Animorphs are dressed nicely because of course they’re surrounded by rich people and need to “fit” in… even though they’re Animorphs and everyone knows that. There’s a lot of chest puffing, and we meet another team that has a rapist on their team. Lotta rapists in this story. He makes a woman shut down due to whatever weird rapey shit he was doing. I instantly hated his character and I’m sure we’ll see way too much from him.

They explain the “game” they’re playing, and the gist is that entire island is being used for the battle. Each “Player” gets to move their “piece” which is the Animorphs. They roll a digital dice, which is B.S., and then move their part. The rich people have already scoped the island and made a strategy, while the poor college student that is still unbelievably wrapped up in all of this, is expected to fail because he only learned of this shit like a day ago. Also, his leg is miraculously cured. On his turn, he picks the best spot on the board and everyone at the table shits their goddamn pants. Then they reveal that Rattle is picking the spots and letting him know via the cameras where to go.

The battles and teams make even less sense. There are teams of three, but they’re on different starting points. That and they show people moving on their own. Like four people show up in the same fucking spot and it took three minutes to show two moves on the opposite side of the story. That and what fucking battle royale runs like a chess board? It again, it’s another example of explaining the rules and then completely breaking them two seconds later. “Everyone moves one at a time, except for when that gets instantly boring, then fuck it!”

The big problem I have with this show is Yuuya’s role in the story. Everyone knows that Hitomi was funded by the guy that morphed her. She won her first fight and everyone wants a piece of her so who cares if her “sponsor” was just some dude for the first fight. Especially when the guy that created the Animorphs is doing all the behind the scene stuff like alliances and setting up fights. Like, why the fuck do they need this guy to pretend that he funded the money on her? With all the other rules broken, this one seems super convenient to keep intact just so that we have this douchebag apart of the story. It’s obvious that he’s going to “save her human side” or some shit, but frankly, neither of them are likable characters. If she spirals out of control and loses her humanity… that might actually be a better story than this dull, pompous shit. Give me the next installment of Bloody Roar already.